Diving in Russia is a popular activity. Usually people indulge in it during their visit to some remote Southern place while having a vacation, but sometimes they want diving without a few hour flight South so the local ponds come into play. They are usually not of great help for divers just because of their poor transparency which

prevents seeing objects even a few feet away and just in general lack of interesting and colorful objects inside of them. This old quarry located near Tver is a different story. The water is pretty clear here compared to the majority of the lakes in Russia and it has some picturesque objects to see and explore.

Koshchey is probably the most the most ugly and mean villain in Russian folklore. He is considered to be the tsar of the underground, a very greedy and highly malicious one. The second name oа this character is Koshchei the Immortal, it’s really quite hard to kill him, though, there are some ways to make him to give up the ghost. If you really want to kill Koshchey, you have to try hard

and make a lot of weird things. Usually this king is described as a tall and skinny old man, who always steals somebody’s fiancée and locks her in the basement of his castle. Still, it’s not very clear why hу does it, because he already has one, Baba Yaga (to be told about next time), which fits him like a glove, being of the same age and appearance.

Bell-ringing is a very old and beautiful tradition of Orthodox churches. Each religious holiday can’t be imagined without melodic ringing of small and huge bells on churches. This profession requires both physical strength and ear for music, and it was passed on from one generation to another up to the Soviet time, then there was a huge period of silence and now it is revived.

Ringing is a real system of musical work, involving not only ability to read musical notes but plasticity and mathematical skills as well. This is a great cultural phenomenon, and to understand it you have to breath with it and fell it with every part of your soul. Or at least click more and see what a few moments of a bell-ringer’s day are like.

On August 2, 1930 near Voronezh a parachute subdivision of 12 men landed in the fields and this started a new tradition of the Soviet and then Russian army. This date is the professional holiday of paratroopers and is celebrated for

already 79 years. Over this period landing troops took part in all armed conflicts of the former USSR. Nowadays these troops are believed to be the elite of the army. The motto of the Blue berets “Nobody but us”.

The great and magnificent Solovetsky Islands, which are usually called Solovki for short include six islands. They can be found in the White Sea in northern Russia, in a deserted area very close to the Arctic Circle. It’s quite hard to get there even in our time, that’s why years ago it this place was used by the government (tsars or the Soviet leaders) as a land for unwanted people to be exhaled. Solovki have seen a lot of cruelty during their long and full life, but in this part of our story we will touch on the positive

aspects of its history, leaving the narration negative experiences for the next time. Solovki used to be and now are one of the most famous places with monasteries and churches. For several decades of the Soviet reign the islands were used only as a location of brutal prison camps, but nowadays they reclaimed their status of a spiritual place and now this place is mecca for tourists and a home for a number of monks. Click more and find a lot of really astonishing facts about the area.